Bay area celebrates Sylvan Beach Festival

Sonya Lynch

The Signal Staff

Residents of LaPorte and surrounding areas celebrated their 54th Annual Sylvan Beach Festival and Crawfish Jam Saturday, April 24.

The 10 a.m. parade was free. Immediately following, the parade, the park was open to residents and visitors alike for a minimal charge.  Park visitors had a choice of live entertainment, a carnival for all ages, games of chance, and the opportunity to shop for arts and crafts under staked-down tents leading to Harris County’s only public beach.  The platform that welcomed live entertainment also introduced the pageant contestants eager to be crowned Miss Sylvan Beach.

Sylvan Beach Park recently experienced what LaPorte calls the “Sylvan Beach Shoreline Protection and Beach Nourishment Project,” which began in May 2009.  This project not only included Harris County and the Port of Houston Authority, but the United States Army Corps of Engineers and Texas General Land Office as well.

The project called for an improvement in shoreline protection by removing the old wooden bulkhead and concrete rubble along the 1,700 feet of shoreline. The shore face has now been armored with stone rubble that helps to slow and trap water, deflecting the impact of waves. A durable sand, chosen specifically for this project, was imported and placed on the 500-foot pockets of beaches and stone groins, which are structures built from the shore, constructed around each pier.  Sidewalks, lighting and pedestrian walkovers made of articulated concrete mattresses that allow for natural vegetation were included in the design.

The sandy beaches that attracted crowds from all over the country in the early 1900s, had begun to erode primarily because of waves from large vessels in the Houston Ship Channel and winds.   In 2007 when $18 million was appropriated by the 80th Texas Legislature for a program implemented specifically to respond to erosion projects, La Porte went to the Texas GLO to apply for funding for this project, the cost of which was estimated at $3.5 million, with Texas GLO covering only 60 percent.

“The re-nourishment of Sylvan Beach is a great asset for the city of La Porte,” said Stacey F. Osborne, economic development coordinator of the city of La Porte.  “It provides a lovely space for people to gather, instills a sense of pride and history in the consciousness of our citizens, and gives us the opportunity to show off our greatest asset: our proximity to Galveston Bay.”

Osborne said people are spreading the word and the weekends at Sylvan Beach Park are beginning to “draw new visitors to our city, and we hope that the increased visitors traffic will also help spur additional retail and tourism development, two things that were identified as priorities in our recent Economic Development Strategic Plan.”

Festival visitors made the crawfish stand their first stop.  A refrigerated truck held bags of live crawfish ready to meet the demands of the festival’s attendees.  Other than the regular carnival items such as cotton candy and funnel cakes, food vendors also offered fajita nachos, fried twinkies, fried pickles and large shrimp just to name a few.  La Porte High School was also out raising funds for their Project Graduation.

“We have raised over $25,000 this year toward Project Graduation and the superintendent and districts have all pitched in to support us even to providing a venue to hold our celebration where we will give out items such as laptops to our students that are going to college,” said Mary Noble, who is chairing Project Graduation.

The La Porte Chamber of Commerce supports this annual festival.

“It takes scores of volunteers to put on the festival and some of our volunteers have given their time and resources to make its programs successful.,” said Colleen Hicks, president of the La Porte Chamber Commerce in La Porte.  “The annual event serves two purposes: it is the largest community event held in the La Porte-Bayshore area for our citizens, and it brings tourists into the area from all over Texas.”

Click the play button below to watch a slideshow of images taken at the Sylvan Beach Festival and Crawfish Jam.